“You feel so fucking good,” he rasps against my lips, and then he kisses me wildly as the pressure between my thighs starts to build until it’s spilling through me like a crashing tidal wave. I cry out his name and writhe on his hand as I tip over into rapture.
As my orgasm ebbs and I relax in his arms, still panting, his mouth traces a line down my jaw. I stare down at him, dizzy with gratitude but also with something more. He slides his fingers from me and moves my panties back into place while I marvel at the tender way he takes care of me.
The door behind Ruger opens, making me jump. But when the man in my arms slides over slightly, I can see Ellery stepping into the bathroom.
Immediately, I rake my gaze over every inch of the sheriff like I can see some tangible evidence of Zara on his skin. Sweats once again hang low on his hips, and just like Ruger, his chest is bare. The sight of him sets ire sizzling in my gut once again.
“You taking care of our girl, brother?” Ellery asks, his eyes banking with heat as he takes in my heaving chest and the way I’m wrapped around his denmate.
“You smell like her,” I growl, irrational fury rising in my chest like a perfectly cooked souffle of fuck that.
“Then help me not to, baby,” Ellery challenges sensually, and he stalks across the bathroom with a deliciously determined stride.
Ruger carries me out of the shower and then unhooks my arms and legs. Spinning me to face Ellery, he pushes me forward until I’m nearly sandwiched between them. I bite back a groan of satisfaction at the manhandling and focus on Ruger asking Ellery if Zara is okay.
Her name makes me want to growl and rage, but I manage to swallow down the possessive insanity and revel in the fact that they’re here with me, not her.
“My bite seems like it’s taking. She was looking better when I left. The guys are getting ready to take her back home for the rest of her recovery. They can’t stand our scents or us being anywhere near her. I think she’ll pull through.”
“Don’t talk about biting her, or I swear I’m going to lose my shit again,” I warn, closing my eyes and breathing through my mouth so the faint scent of Zara doesn’t send me crashing back into crazy.
“You need to mark your territory. You’ll feel better after that,” Ellery murmurs, and the way he says it has all kinds of dirty images flashing in my mind.
He slowly steps closer as though he’s giving me time to decide if I want him there. I tilt my head back as Ellery claims my space, his bare chest brushing against my wet sports bra and my peaked, sensitive nipples.
I allow it.
“Mark me with your scent,” he urges. “It won’t be enough for me to simply not smell like her; you’ll need me to smell like you before your instincts will stop riding you so hard.”
His gaze drinks me in like I’m water in the desert. I’m pretty sure mine does the same.
“I can smell your hunger. I won’t push you, but if you don’t soothe your wolf’s needs, it’s just going to trigger another rage. Then we’ll be right back here again.”
“Not that we’re complaining,” Ruger adds as he pulls my wet hair out of the tangle of a bun it’s in. Instead, he lets it fall down against my back.
“What do you need, Noah?” Ellery whispers, his nose skimming mine, his lips so close and yet not nearly close enough.
“I still want to kick your ass,” I whisper back, my anger and frustration not ready to completely disappear, although the two of them are way too good at distracting me from it.
Ellery and Ruger both laugh.
“Then kick my ass,” Ellery easily concedes. “I promise to stand there and thank you for touching it at all.”
I snort and then almost choke as Ellery runs the tip of a finger just barely inside the top of my underwear. Ruger smooths his hands over my ribs, sliding down until he’s slowly stroking my stomach.
I force myself to focus on my breathing so I don’t hyperventilate and pass out before things start to get really good.
“What do you need, mate?” Ellery asks me again, his lips skimming lightly over mine on the last word, like he’s daring me to deny it.
But fuck me, that word sounds so damn good falling from his lips.
His pupils dilate as I flood the bathroom with the scent of my undiluted desire. Black overtakes the bright blue of his eyes, leaving only a tiny glowing azure ring. The desperate ache inside of me expands.
“You. I need you,” I finally admit, and then I thread my fingers through his golden locks and kiss him.
Furious possessiveness overtakes everything else. Need becomes as powerful as gravity and grows heavier with each passing second. The word mine rings through our connection, and my hungry kiss spells out the message. Then my tongue repeats it. And my hands.
I nip and bite and punish—relishing Ellery’s moans. At the same time, I push my ass back against Ruger’s hard cock, needing to feel both of them at once. He sucks on my pulse, his tongue fluttering in time with my pounding heart.
There’s a sudden shift in the air that sends me mentally spinning, caught in a whirlpool of impulse and yearning. All of the shifter needs that have been brawling with my rational mind surge forward and take over completely. I sink. I drown in them, and I don’t care if I ever come up for air.
My fingers knot behind Ellery’s neck as I pull him even closer. The desire to use my tongue to lap away all traces of anyone else on his skin grows stronger. I rub against him, dropping my hands to his body and stroking my scent all over him. His pull is magnetic. Power radiates off him in warm waves. He’s a force to be reckoned with.
A force that could be my alpha.
My mate.
My future…if I let him, let them.
Something suddenly changes between us. It’s as though Ellery can taste the direction of my thoughts, because one second I’m kissing the shit out of him, and in the next, he takes control.
My brain stalls. My toes curl. My knees actually go weak. Ruger’s presence at my back, his hands around my waist, are the only reason I don’t drop to my ass.
“Noah.” That’s all he says—just Ellery’s voice in my head, my name floating from his thoughts, unfurling like a flower in my mind, delicate, beautiful, and so full of meaning that I can’t fully comprehend it…and yet I feel it.
A brilliant, all-encompassing surge of power sizzles through our connection, and for a split second, I feel invincible. Immortal. I feel everything.
Him.
Me.
Ruger, Perth, and Gannon.
They fit into little nooks in my soul. Everything they are expands into those carved-out pieces of my heart. What I always thought of as holes suddenly become spaces…spaces that were simply waiting for them. Like these men were always meant to be a part of who I am.
Ruger retreats as Ellery’s hands clasp my ass, lifting me until I wrap around him. He walks us out of the bathroom and into the bedroom. His lips are gentle against mine, softening and withdrawing until they’re the barest whisper of touch, drawing me in until I whimper an objection.
Ellery pulls back, his blue eyes glowing with shifter magic and desire as he sets me on my feet. I pant, confused as I stare up at him, pressed against his chiseled body, my own senses humming.